An Observation of Love
by kjcp
Summary: COMPLETE Things change. People grow together, people grow apart. Relationships blossom and love forges on. In the midst of war, the only thing anyone can truly count on is love. A oneshot told in 3 POVs. COMPLETE


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**An Observation of Love**

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_Things change. People grow together, people grow apart. Relationships blossom and love forges on. In the midst of war, the only thing anyone can truly count on is love. A one-shot told in 3 POVs._

_Dedicated to all of CM Forumers who have been craving a HBP-canon fic. I love CM. I do._

_This isn't beta-read. I'll get my beta to read it before I submit it to CM when the queue reopens. Cheers. Oh, leave a review if you must ;)_

_WARNING: HBP SPOILERS!_

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Harry looked up at the castle. Second-years to his fellow seventh-years were all filing inside it; first-years were still crossing the lake. It looked as though only about a fourth of the students had returned to Hogwarts.

He knew that Ron and Hermione stood behind him, maybe holding hands, maybe not, but he knew the look on their faces would be rather grave as well. They were the ones who convinced him to come back. It had proved to be very difficult to keep The Burrow under good protection with so many people coming and going, so Hogwarts had been deemed the safest place now that the Vanishing Cabinets had been destroyed.

It had been an odd summer to say the least. Uncle Vernon had been incensed when Harry announced that Ron and Hermione would be staying until his birthday.

'But there's no room, boy!' Uncle Vernon had yelled.

'That's all right,' replied Harry. 'They can stay in my room.'

'You can't have a _girl_ stay in your room!'

'Would you like to try and stop me?'

'There's only one bed,' Dudley sniffed, 'so your lot will have to go away.'

'We can conjure up other beds, Dud,' said Harry.

'You can't do magic outside of school!' bellowed Uncle Vernon.

'I can,' Ron had said, stepping a bit closer to the Dursleys. 'I'm seventeen.'

'Me as well,' said Hermione, smiling. 'It's all right. I don't eat much, but Ron – well, he'll probably eat you out of house and home, but it appears you are used to that.' Hermione looked at Dudley with a disgusted look upon her face. Dudley stood up straighter and sucked in his stomach.

So Ron and Hermione had come home with him for a month. Hermione immediately used an enlargement spell – much like the one that had been placed on the tents they used during the World Cup – on Harry's room so that it expanded to two separate rooms. She didn't fancy sharing a room with boys, she told them.

The moment Harry turned seventeen, Uncle Vernon came knocking on the door, telling them to all get the hell out of his house. Harry obliged and they all left for The Burrow. After Bill and Fleur's wedding, the three of them left for Grimmauld Place, even though Harry swore he'd never go there again. They spent a good bit of time looking through all the leftover possessions there for a possible Horcrux. Harry had gained possession of Dumbledore's notes and Pensieve and used those to find where the other Horcruxes might be. It took the rest of summer, but they were able to find two more.

Then, the time came to go back to school. Surprisingly, Ron and Hermione were eager to return. Well, not surprising for Hermione so much as she was named Head Girl by the new Headmistress – McGonagall. Ron was still a prefect ('I didn't want to be Head Boy anyway,' he'd said) and Harry still Quidditch Captain, although he was going to decline the position.

Harry let them talk him into returning, mostly because he didn't want to have to fight Voldemort without them. He needed them. Together they were all so much stronger.

'You all right?' asked Hermione, placing a hand on Harry's shoulder.

'It's odd to think that we're back here without Dumbledore,' answered Harry.

'I know, mate,' said Ron. 'Let's go eat, though. I'm hungry.'

'Big surprised,' muttered Hermione.

Once they entered the Great Hall, Harry noticed Gryffindor table was only half-filled. Seamus and Parvati were nowhere to be seen. Lavender was seated across from Neville and Dean and once her eyes rested on Ron, she promptly turned her back to him and leaned over the table to say something undoubtedly witty to Dean who smiled weakly.

Harry, Ron, and Hermione sat as far away from the others as they could, figuring Lavender wouldn't want to be anywhere near Ron and Hermione, and Dean was still not overly friendly to Harry.

They sat, Harry on one side, Ron and Hermione on the other. Harry noticed they sat closer than usual, but he wasn't surprised; the two of them had been changing right in front of his eyes all summer.

It was noticeable, Harry supposed, at Dumbledore's funeral when Ron held Hermione and stroked her hair. Everything was such an emotional upheaval that day that Harry hadn't invested much thought into their actions.

At Privet Drive they were less obvious, probably for Harry's sake. They never seemed to miss an opportunity to touch one another, though. Ron would grab Hermione's quill away from her or Hermione would give him an extra long hug before going to bed for the night. At Bill and Fleur's wedding was when Harry knew something was definitely up. Hermione asked Ron to dance and he actually said yes – and something that Ron just did not do was dance... ever. So they danced and Harry watched from the sidelines, feeling rather amused. Before the song was even over, Ron took Hermione by the hand and led her away. Harry could only guess what they were doing.

The few days they spent at The Burrow after that were awkward. Harry had no idea what to say to Ginny anymore. It felt as though someone was twisting his heart whenever he saw her. She did her best to act as though nothing had happened, but Harry was still relieved when he left with Ron and Hermione for Grimmauld Place.

They all could have had their separate rooms there, but something felt right about sleeping in their old ones. Several times, Harry woke up to find Ron absent. The first time Harry waited for him to get back, but after fifteen minutes got sick of staring up at the ceiling, listening for the floorboards to creak. So he got up and went in search of Ron. He heard his voice from the drawing room and found him sitting on the settee with Hermione. They were facing each other, less than a cushion apart, and Ron's fingers were playing with her bushy hair. A tear dripped down Hermione's cheek and Ron reached out with his other hand to wipe it away. There was something too intimate about the scene for Harry to interrupt and he retreated back to his room.

Harry wasn't sure what was going to happen now they were back at Hogwarts. He didn't care if they finally decided to be a couple. He assumed they already were from the little he had observed, but he'd never seen them kiss or do more than hold hands, really. They hadn't told him one way or another, but how does something like that come up in conversation anyway?

'Ah, chicken!' said Ron enthusiastically once the food had popped up on the table. He reached for a leg and immediately bit into it. He sighed. 'I wuf hunfry.'

Hermione looked as though she was struggling not to roll her eyes. 'Ron, close your mouth.'

'Sowwy.' He swallowed. 'I miss the food here. It's so good.'

Hermione, for all her strength, smiled and ate her food with fork and knife. They were silent as they ate. It wasn't unusual though for them to fall into silence – the three of them had grown into this understanding of one another that words didn't need to penetrate. The way they looked at one another told each other everything. Which was another reason why Harry was positive that Ron and Hermione had crossed over the boundary of friends to dating. He knew them both so well and the way they looked at one another told him almost everything he needed to know.

Still, he could never been one-hundred percent positive since neither of them had ever said anything to him.

After McGonagall made the start-of-term announcements – most of which were grave and depressing – Hermione suggested they all go back to the common room. There were only five new first-year Gryffindors, all of whom went straight up to their rooms. The common room emptied fairly quickly and soon the only ones left were Harry, Ron, and Hermione.

'Are you all right, Harry,' asked Hermione, 'being back here?'

'I'm actually all right,' said Harry. He gave them a weak smile. 'This place just seems to be everything that I don't want to remember.' His eyes looked at the fire, remembering when Sirius' head had popped out of it. 'I think I'll go on to bed.'

'Are you sure, mate?' asked Ron.

Harry nodded. 'I'm sure.' He got up and went over to the boys' dormitory staircases and climbed up. Neville and Dean were already in bed, although neither were snoring so Harry figured they were both still awake. He undressed, got into his pyjamas, and pulled back the covers of his four-poster bed. He wasn't actually tired; he needed a break from everyone. He needed a break to think.

Life was so strange. It felt as though someone else was living his life – as though he was merely watching. The summer had been uneventful for the most part. Granted, they had found some of the Horcruxes, but there had been no fights, no deaths. All the while, Harry had to watch his two best friends become... what? Certainly not lovers – not yet, anyway.

Oh, how Harry did love them both, though. They were clearly together and yet nothing had changed between the three of them. Harry hardly ever felt like a gooseberry, which he was grateful for.

Why was he up here if he wasn't going to sleep? Deciding that maybe he'd go back downstairs, Harry dropped his blankets and left the dormitory quietly. He was almost all the way back downstairs when he heard it. The sounds of two people kissing. He knew it well – he and Ginny had kissed frequently. Er, his stomach did that odd twisty thing when ever he thought of Ginny. He had to make himself stop it.

'Wait,' he heard Hermione say. 'Before I forget—'

'_Hermione_,' whinged Ron.

'Shh! I'll be right back.'

When Harry heard her run up the girls' staircase, he came down the boys'.

'So,' said Harry, causing Ron's head to whip around, 'manhandling my best friend, are you?'

Ron's cheeks turned red. 'I thought you went to bed.'

'Well, I realised I wasn't tired.'

'Mm,' hummed Ron.

'It's not as though I didn't know.'

'What? You've been keeping quiet?'

'_Me_? You two haven't exactly been forthcoming, y'know!'

'Yeah, I know,' grumbled Ron. 'It wasn't planned that way.'

'It's all right,' said Harry. 'I didn't exactly tell you I fancied Ginny, either. I kept that hushed up really well.'

Ron nodded. 'Yeah, mate, you did. Do you still—?'

'Let's not talk about her. Not now. So, you and Hermione, then?'

Ron nodded again. 'Yeah. I bet you never saw that happening, did you?'

'Oh, I had a fair idea. So, er, do you love her?' asked Harry.

The tips of Ron's ears turned red. 'Er, well, that is I – er... yes, I reckon I do,' answered Ron, refusing to look Harry in the eye.

'Does she know?'

Ron's mouth curled up in a small smile. 'Yeah,' he said quietly, 'she knows.'

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It began with the break-up. No, that was a lie. Okay, it began before that – several years before, but he had been reluctant to admit it. The break-up had fast forwarded everything for them. There was no longer any reason to keep from being together. All their excuses were gone.

But the break-up helped them. When Lavender saw them walk down the stairs from the boys' dormitory, she immediately launched into a thirty-minute rendition of 'You fancy her instead of me.' He didn't deny it. In fact, he didn't say much of anything. She was quiet as well, right by his side, close enough that he could feel the heat from her body against her arm.

Then, Lavender ran off crying, and the two of them looked at one another – and while they said nothing, the look in their eyes said it all.

If he was truthful, the feelings he had for her kicked in around third-year. Or second. He couldn't really remember anymore, but it was because she was a girl and it was natural to feel things around girls. Then, everything he felt turned into jealousy when she was asked by Vicky to the ball. Jealousy was still the prominent feeling in fifth-year as well, as she often wrote letters to her older, famous, rich, Quidditch-playing, quasi-boyfriend. The realisation that the jealousy was really what it felt like to fancy someone hit him in the stomach like one of Fred and George's really bad Stomach Upsetters – a new 'treat' in the Deluxe Skiving Snackboxes.

She, then, asked him out. He didn't need to ask if she wanted to go to Slughorn's party as a date because he knew she did – he knew _he_ did. But learning that she had snogged Krum, after all the times she told him that she and Krum were only friends, was the worst day of his life. Well, one of the worst days, anyway. Really, the day his teddy turned into a spider was still on his list of very bad days.

The Lavender thing was the biggest mistake of his life. The more she clung, the more he realised he didn't want her. She was pretty, he supposed. Well, she was blonde anyway. She wasn't _her_... and that's what mattered most.

So when they were officially no longer dating, it was clear that now they had a perfect shot. Unfortunately, their alone time was fair and few and just when they would start talking about important things, they were always interrupted.

The major turning point, and he knew it was a major turning point himself, which he was proud of because perhaps his emotional range had gone from a teaspoon to a whole cup, was during Dumbledore's funeral. She cried and he wasn't horrified. In fact, he found he _wanted_ to comfort her. It was easily done, and her hair was soft and she felt so good in his arms.

But that wasn't as important as Bill and Fleur's wedding. After spending a month at the Dursley's (and promptly checking every meal to make sure it wasn't poisoned), they all went to The Burrow. And at the reception, they sat at a table with Harry, and she asked him to dance.

'I can't dance,' he told her.

'I don't mind,' she said, grabbing his hand and pulling him to his feet.

'I mean, I _really_ can't dance.'

She laughed lightly. 'It's all right.'

'Oh, you talked me into it.'

So he held her close, her feet bare on the grass of the back garden of The Burrow. They had both long-since shed their dress robes and were wearing Muggle clothes underneath. She had on a blue dress and her hair was pulled back with a hair charm of sorts. She looked like she had back at the Yule Ball, when he first noticed she was beautiful.

'Hey, let's get out of here,' he said.

She looked at him oddly, but that was all right because he didn't think he could be stuck dancing with her for much longer. Holding her so close did funny things to his stomach and lungs and he was afraid he might actually be sick with something.

They walked around to the front garden and sat on the front step of his house, side by side and holding hands, as they so often did nowadays.

'How long do you want to stay?' he asked.

'Here? Oh, I don't know, until Harry's ready to leave, I suppose. I think he's decided the next safest place will be Grimmauld Place. No one else can find it, can they? We'll be safe there. We're Unplottable there.'

He nodded. 'I miss home a bit, though.'

'How come?'

'It reminds me when things were easy. When I was nine.'

She laughed. 'War definitely changes things.'

'Yeah.' Then, he looked at her and something snapped inside his head. 'I'm sorry about Lavender,' he blurted.

'I'm sorry about Krum.'

'So we're even, then, I suppose.'

'Even? I don't know about "even", Won-Won.'

He groaned, but he knew she was joking. 'You look nice,' he said.

'Oh.' She looked almost taken aback. 'Thank you.'

'What?' he asked, confused by her reaction.

'You've just never complimented me about my looks before. You usually just call me clever.'

'Well, you are. But I think you're pretty, too.'

She blushed. 'Thanks.'

'Although, you have something—' He reached out to brush an eyelash off her nose, but forgot that's what he was doing mid-way through, and put his hand behind her ear, cradling her head just so, as he leaned in and kissed her.

His stomach and lungs started doing jumping jacks again in his abdomen, but that was all right as long as he could keep kissing her.

That was the first kiss. The one of many kisses. Many kisses, many touches, many late-night talks that led to early-morning snogs. But they still needed to tell one person: Harry.

They didn't tell him, though, which was fine because it never came up in conversation. Although, he had a fairly good idea that Harry knew where he snuck off to at night. Once, he had gone to the drawing room with her and they talked about what it meant now that Dumbledore was dead. And tears fell down her cheeks and he wiped them away – and they both heard the floorboards squeak, but when they looked, no one was there.

It was that night, on that very settee, that Ron first said the words to her.

'You don't need to cry.'

'I don't _want_ to cry.' She sniffled and tried to smile at him through her tears and red nose.

'Say, Hermione?'

'Yes, Ron?'

'I love you.'

It was the first time he said, the first time she heard it, and the first time they both knew those words to be actually true. The declaration was followed by kissing and touching and forgotten memories about the past and the war. It was easy to get caught up in each other when everything else seemed so awful.

So when it came time to go back to school, they were excited as they could have possibly got at the prospect of going back to a school where only half their fellow students were coming back to. They ate their feast and went back to their common room, and when Harry left, they kissed. But then she remembered something – whatever it was, he didn't know – and left. And Harry came down the stairs. How long had he been there?

'It's not as though I didn't know,' said Harry.

'What? You've been keeping quiet?'

'_Me_? You two haven't exactly been forthcoming, y'know!'

'Yeah, I know,' he grumbled. 'It wasn't planned that way.'

They hadn't planned on keeping things a secret from Harry. They never talked about _not_ telling him; it had never actually come up.

'It's all right,' said Harry. 'I didn't exactly tell you I fancied Ginny, either. I kept that hushed up really well.'

He nodded. 'Yeah, mate, you did. Do you still—?'

'Let's not talk about her. Not now. So, you and Hermione, then?'

He nodded again. 'Yeah. I bet you never saw that happening, did you?'

'Oh, I had a fair idea. So, er, do you love her?' asked Harry.

He felt his ears heat up. Admitting it to her was one thing, telling his best mate was another. 'Er, well, that is I – er... yes, I reckon I do,' he answered, refusing to look Harry in the eye.

'Does she know?'

His mouth curled up in a small smile. 'Yeah,' he said quietly, 'she knows.'

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Hermione was a very normal girl. A bit obsessive about school, yes, but she wanted to be the smartest, most cleverest witch in all of Hogwarts. Well, she succeeded admirably. In any case, she was normal. She had normal emotions. So she never worried that her relationship with Ron was anything but normal either.

It began with her hating him. But then he saved her life from the troll so she liked him again.

Liking him wasn't really a problem the next year... Although, she only liked him in between jokes about her fancying Lockhart, and then, she was unconscious for most of the year after that, though.

She liked him well enough until he went off on her about Crookshanks eating Scabbers. Then, she hated him most indefinitely.

That slowly subsided and she liked him again. Until he went barmy about Viktor Krum and she had to start hating him once more.

The year after that was a bit of a rush. She liked him, hated him, liked him, hated him, then liked him again. He gave her perfume for Christmas, so she liked for a long bit, but then he went mad about her writing Krum, so she had to hate him once more.

Oi, but this past year... She started out liking him. He started out liking her as well. Then, he had to try and eat Lavender's face in front of her, so she hated him again. She wasn't thrilled with Lavender, either, though.

She hated him for a good long time until he almost died, and then she liked him again. And she liked him all throughout the rest of the year. And she loved him by the time they were at Dumbledore's funeral.

So, none of that was anything but normal because Hermione was a normal girl.

Hermione didn't like to think about Ron and Lavender. The whole experience was rather humiliating, albeit amusing when Lavender finally broke things off. After that, it was smooth sailing, even if the sailing was slow.

She liked to think about Bill and Fleur's wedding. Ron didn't want to dance, but he did so anyway because she asked. When he held her, his hands burnt into her. She felt hot all over, as though she was going to explode. Her heart skipped around so fast she thought she was going to have a heart attack and even though she was surrounded by dancing couples, she didn't see anyone except for Ron.

When he said he wanted to get out of there, she was grateful; she needed to cool off. They went to the front garden and sat on his front stoop. She couldn't remember their conversation – it wasn't very important – she just remembered their kiss.

Their first kiss.

And in that moment, when he finally touched his lips to hers, she felt something explode behind her eyes and inside her chest. This was what it felt liked to be loved.

It didn't matter what was going on in the world around them. The war, Voldemort, Horcruxes – it was all inconsequential to this moment. It didn't matter if Voldemort killed them both because he would never be able to penetrate their love, how they felt about one another. Hermione knew it was a part of life – that lives change; people grow apart and come together; relationships blossom and love forges on; and in the midst of war, that's the only thing you can truly count on: love.

Hermione let Krum kiss her once. It was nice to be kissed. It was nice to be liked, especially when the boy she fancied didn't seem to notice her at all. Then, there was the monstrosity that she had come to call McPrat – and, well, the incident with the mistletoe. She preferred not to think much about that, though.

Well, the point was, no one ever kissed her like Ron kissed. Like he meant it. Like he loved her.

They continued to steal kisses from one another for the rest of the summer. And when Ron said he loved her while they were at Grimmauld Place, Hermione thought she was going to die from sheer happiness. That night they did more than kiss – a lot more. She let him touch her and hold her and do things to her that she only heard Lavender and Parvati giggle about over _Witch Weekly_ magazine.

They still hadn't told Harry, though, and Hermione wondered how he was going to take it. She didn't think he would care too much, but he might be miffed they waited so long to let him know. She didn't know that he was going to find out on their first night back to Hogwarts.

The common room was empty, Harry was upstairs, and Ron was sitting next to her on the sofa. He leaned towards her, kissed her, and let his tongue make slow circles around hers in her mouth. Suddenly, she remembered something and dashed up the stairs. When she came back down, she heard Harry's voice:

'It's not as though I didn't know.'

'What? You've been keeping quiet?' said Ron, clearly surprised.

'_Me_? You two haven't exactly been forthcoming, y'know!'

'Yeah, I know,' grumbled Ron. 'It wasn't planned that way.'

'It's all right,' said Harry. 'I didn't exactly tell you I fancied Ginny, either. I kept that hushed up really well.'

Ron nodded. 'Yeah, mate, you did. Do you still—?'

'Let's not talk about her. Not now. So, you and Hermione, then?'

Ron nodded again. 'Yeah. I bet you never saw that happening, did you?'

'Oh, I had a fair idea. So, er, do you love her?' asked Harry.

The tips of Ron's ears turned red. 'Er, well, that is I – er... yes, I reckon I do,' answered Ron, refusing to look Harry in the eye.

'Does she know?'

Ron's mouth curled up in a small smile. 'Yeah,' he said quietly, 'she knows.'

Hermione had to smile as well. Yes, she knew. Oh, she definitely knew. And that's what was important – that in the midst of war, they still had love.

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End

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